id: permaculture-design-charrette
title: Permaculture Design Charrette
description: >-
  A collaborative design process where a group produces a site design in an
  intensive, time-bounded session, drawing on permaculture ethics of
  earth care, people care, and fair share. Originating in the permaculture
  movement founded by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren in Australia.
source: Permaculture movement / Bill Mollison and David Holmgren
source_url: https://www.permaculture.org.uk/
tags: [permaculture, design, collaboration, environmental]
forked_from: null
image: null
steps:
  - headline: Survey the site and people
    description: >-
      The group walks the site together, observing contours, water, sun,
      existing vegetation, and use patterns. They also survey the needs
      and capacities of the people who will use it.
  - headline: Identify functions and elements
    description: >-
      The group lists the functions the design must serve — food, water,
      shelter, habitat — and the elements that could meet them.
  - headline: Place elements for beneficial relationships
    description: >-
      Working on a shared map, the group places each element where it
      creates beneficial relationships with others — chickens near the
      garden, water tanks above the irrigation point.
  - headline: Present and critique
    description: >-
      Subgroups present their proposed placements; the whole group critiques
      for missed relationships and unmet needs, iterating the design.
  - headline: Record the design
    description: >-
      The final design is recorded on a shared map with a written rationale
      for each placement, and next steps are assigned.
outcome: >-
  A site design is produced that integrates human and ecological needs
  through the placement of elements in beneficial relationship.
practice: >-
  The site walk is not optional — design without observation produces
  inappropriate designs. Let the land and its patterns lead, not the
  designer's preferences.